Thursday, June 30, 2016

So many actresses, from veterans to newcomers, yearned for that role, fought for it tooth and nail. But Olivia de Havilland wanted to play Melanie.

The mug shot and her surname misspelled on the placard may reflect the assembly line nature of The Golden Age of Hollywood, but they do not detract from the elegance, the power of the woman who knew who she was, and who knew who Melanie was.

We take a moment today to marvel at the 100th birthday tomorrow of this glorious actress, and to recall at least one quality that made her different. As regards her role as Melanie in Gone with the Wind (1939), Olivia responded in an interview for the Academy of Achievement.

Jack [Warner], for example, said, "Oh, you don't want to play Melanie. You want to play Scarlett." I said, "I don't want to play Scarlett. I want Melanie." It's because I was so young. I had for four years been earning my own living, going through all the problems of a career woman, self-supporting and even contributing to the support of others, which is what Scarlett did. That's what Scarlett did. So, I knew about being Scarlett in a sense, but Melanie was someone different. She had very, deeply feminine qualities. Scarlett was a self-absorbed person. She had to be. Career women have to be, that's all there is to it. But, Melanie was "other people-oriented," and she had these feminine qualities that I felt were very endangered at that time, and they are from generation to generation, and that somehow they should be kept alive, and one way I could contribute to their being kept alive was to play Melanie, and that's why I wanted to interpret her role.

Happy Birthday, Olivia de Havilland. There is much to celebrate in your career. Thank you.

Thursday, June 16, 2016

Who wants a free audio book?ANN BLYTH: ACTRESS. SINGER. STAR., narrated by Toni Lewis (see last week's interview here) will soon be available at Amazon, Audible, and iTunes. I will pick one reader from this blog to receive a FREE download. The audio book will be for sale shortly.I will also give a free audio book download to the first eight people who agree to review the book on it's Amazon page here.If you want to put your name in for the raffle for a free audio download, send me an email with the subject line: GIMME THE FREE AUDIO BOOK to: JacquelineTLynch@gmail.com.If you want to review the book in exchange for a free copy, send me an email to the same address, but the subject line should be REVIEW BOOK.It was just about this time last year that I published my book on Ann Blyth's career (June 18th, actually), and I don't think any writing project I've ever done has meant more to me. Thanks for being part of the journey.

Thursday, June 9, 2016

This is to remind you of my
upcoming AUDIO book version of Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. I expect it to be available for purchase very soon. Later this month I'll hold a random drawing for a free copy of the audio book. I will also offer a free copy to the first eight people who agree to review the book on Amazon in exchange for a copy.

Los Angeles area actress Toni
Lewis is doing the narration, and her work is brilliant. She kindly participated in an interview with
me, and here’s what we discussed:

***

JTL: I was struck by your adopting different
“voices” and adding personality to the many quotes in the book. I had never heard that done in an audio book
before, and I marvel at what an acting challenge that must be—to find the
element, the key in a passage to give you a hook to the character of that
voice. I like the lower, dryer tone of
speech for Madge Tucker, as if illustrating this is a kindly, genteel, but
harried woman dealing with children on live radio, with a touch of New York
businesswoman inflection. There is playfulness in your characterizations,
including the funny “Bert Lahr” voice for the mountie he played in Rose Marie, and so many occasions where
your reading of a quote stands out from the narrative and gives splashes of
color to this rather long book. Speeding
up the speech of the old Hollywood critics and gossip columnists, to emulate
the staccato radio news delivery of the day, I thought was pretty neat. Some line readings brought me to tears, or
shocked me. You mentioned to me about
the script that you “treated it like a piece of music with shading and tempo,”
which is delightful.

The voice you use for Ann is
chosen very wisely, I think. The tone is
quiet, demure, but not an attempt at an exact imitation of her voice—which I
think is appropriate. And
practical—because I don’t think it’s really possible to imitate her. She
displayed such a keen ability to change her voice from film to film that she
never had any vocal “tics” that one could caricature. Katharine Hepburn, or Humphrey Bogart come to
mind as films stars who were always easily imitated by comics who exaggerated
the peculiar speech habits of these actors.
Your “Ann” in the audio has a clean sound, is a lovely example of sensitive
and judicious narration. Was her voice a
particular concern or challenge to you?

TL: For the most
part (except for Ann Blyth), I didn't go out of my way to listen and study the
real person's voice, because it was more fun to create the voice
myself. After being introduced to Ann through the book, I
sought out a few interviews online to get the feel of her
personality. I was able to find some excerpts of Mildred Pierce and watched Mr. Peabody and the Mermaid in its
entirety (but she didn't speak!). Her softness was balanced by her
faith and confidence (both powerful and firm), which gave her the strength to
navigate the rough waters of Hollywood. A person gets a sense from
the book that acting was her destiny. I wanted to convey all of that
in the voice I gave her. She was and still seems to be a calm and
steady force.

JTL: You mentioned in an email to me that you were
sorry to come to the last chapter because you had fallen in love with Ann
Blyth, and were a new convert to Turner
Classic Movies. That really touched me,
and I hope you enjoy many years of discovery of old movies. I would not be surprised if you knew very
little about her career before you started narrating the book, because since
her last movie was made decades ago, she has fallen off the radar in pop
culture—though in the late 1940s and 1950s she was as famous as anyone could be
in Hollywood. You are an actress
yourself, you’ve played roles on television.
I think that gives you an insight, an appreciation of the challenges of
her career that I don’t have, that many of our listeners/readers won’t
have. You’ve gone on auditions,
performed, rehearsed, and worked with directors, technical crew, dealt all the
business aspects to the career. Do you
agree that your familiarity with the acting profession may give you empathy in
your approach to your narration on the career of this actress that a non-actor
might not have?

TL:
You're right. I knew nothing about Ann Blyth before this book came
along. As an actress, I could totally relate to her career and the challenges
she faced as a woman in this business. She faced it all with grace and I
admire her for it. At times I saw myself in her shoes. I'm a singer
as well, so her musical theatre experience is something I relate to
strongly. While reading, I could visualize the environment because of my
experience on stage and in front of the camera. I recognize the desire to
keep your private life just that…private. Her approach to the craft and
her work ethic is an example of how hard work pays off and I'm struck by how
successful she was, while not allowing the Hollywood machine to change the
essence of who she was. As with many projects in the course of a career
like this, you grow attached to your subject matter. It was bittersweet
to see my time with Ann draw to a close. I got choked-up. I had
spent so much time walking in shoes that resembled mine it felt more
personal. A career is what you make it. She made a wonderful
career and was one of the lucky few to do that. It's great to see a woman
have it all or at least as much as she wants.

JTL:Ann
Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. is a big book. I’m so impressed by how you navigated some of
the ridiculously long sentences (listening to you has really made me see my
faults as a writer). I have a tendency
to begin very long compound sentences, plunking in a semicolon, and then go
have a cup of tea or bring in the mail, or have the oil changed in my car—and
then I come back to finish the sentence.
No, really. That’s why they
ramble on like that. Is fiction different
for you as a narrator than non-fiction, does it require a different approach or
a different set of muscles, so to speak?

TL: Yes,
a different set of muscles is right. I find that non-fiction books
require more of a smile in the voice and a little higher register in order to
hold the attention of the listener. This produces a more pleasant
experience, especially for long-form books. Because fiction is often
suspenseful, a lower register is used to draw the listener in. I just
finished a novel by Warren Adler called CULT. It was like night to
the daylight of Ann Blyth. Both amazing projects but performed from
opposite ends of the spectrum.

JTL: How did you get into audio book narration,
and what are some of the challenges and pleasures of doing this kind of
work? Can you describe what it’s like to
narrate a book? Do you use a local
studio, or do you have a home studio with the technical wizardry to record and
edit tracks?

TL:Like Ann Blyth, I am no longer twenty-something and I wanted to continue
to perform and create, so after years of pounding the pavement, I thought I
would combine my love of reading with my love of acting. I set up a sound
booth in my home and started auditioning in my pajamas. It's been so
wonderful. The freedom of performing and producing books gives me such
joy! I usually record in the evening because of daily environmental
noise. I do the recording myself in sessions that usually last five to
six hours each. Before recording, I read the book, make notes, breakdown
the characters and try out different vocal registers for each. Sometimes
a voice will just come to me. Others, I have to play around with to make
sure they have their own sound/accent. The hard part is keeping the voices
consistently vivid. Some days the environment affects the voice, so I
have to do a longer warm-up and keep the vocal tea flowing. I use a
wonderful editor who is a wizard at making me sound great. My life is happier
and I have a calm I've never felt before. This work just fits my lifestyle.
I'm happy and my family is happy.

JTL: Are there any upcoming projects you’d like to
share, either as an actress or narrator?

TL:
I mentioned Warren Adler's book CULT.
It should be coming out soon on Amazon as well. That was a fun project with a lot of voices (mostly men).

JTL: Please feel free to any anything you’d like
to discuss that I may not have touched upon.

TL: I could tell that Ann Blyth was a labor of
love for you and after four months, I love her story as well. My hope is that I was able to bring another
dimension to the work and help listeners of the book feel uplifted and more
knowledgeable about that time in Hollywood's history. Who better to give us that perspective than someone like Ann
Blyth who came out on the other side happy and prosperous?

*******************

My deepest gratitude to Toni Lewis for her
marvelous performance as narrator on Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star., and for sharing her sensitive and
articulate comments here. I feel
extremely lucky to have been able to work with her on this audio project, and I
am in awe of her talent.

***

Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star. is, of course,
already available in eBook and in paperback from Amazon and CreateSpace.

A star of films, stage (including
Broadway), television, radio, nightclubs and concerts, Ann Blyth is a stellar
example of talent and professionalism, and her journey through the
entertainment industry of the twentieth century is colorful and fascinating.

The most interesting aspect about
her acting is that unlike most stars of the day she was not content to play the
same kind of roles over and over again. She swam against the powerful and
unrelenting current of studio typecasting. It was usual for studios at that
time, which controlled the kinds of movies that their actors played in, to
promote an actor in a particular kind of role and to assign them similar
roles thereafter. An actor was marketed to the
public as a heavy or the hero, or weepy heroine, or a stumbling foolish comic.
Usually they played the same character over and over again.

Today we have someone like Meryl
Streep, who is very versatile and we expect that of her. When we go to see a Meryl Streep movie, we
expect her to sound different and look different. She’s working in an environment today where
she is free to adopt that kind of versatility.
Indeed, it’s become her calling card, her trademark, but back in the day
when Ann Blyth was one of the most famous stars of her era, her versatility was
certainly admired and appreciated, but I don’t think it was used to its best
advantage by the studios. A confounding
set of circumstances has made Blyth’s unique career largely unfamiliar among
younger classic film fans

To appreciate how ironic that is
we need to note that back in the late 1940s and 1950s she was one of the most
famous stars of her day, featured on countless magazine covers, pursued by
columnists, receiving thousands of fan letters every week.

Ann Blyth remains a mystery to
newcomers to classic film who know little about her, perhaps for two reasons:
she made 32 movies in her career but most of them are not on DVD and most of
them are not being shown on Turner Classic Movies. This is because most of the movies you see on
Turner are Warner Bros., or MGM movies, or Columbia -- many different
studios, but a lot of Ann Blyth’s movies were made for Universal and Turner
does not show a lot of Universal movies or a lot of Paramount movies. Today, Turner Classic Movies is pretty much
the main channel that we would go to watch a classic film. We have hundreds of channels on our cable
television, but very few show old movies these days.

My hope is Ann Blyth: Actress. Singer. Star.
will help newcomers to classic film discover the work of this marvelous
actress, and to remind those of us more familiar with the classics not to
overlook this quiet, lovely champion.

The AUDIO book will be soon
available through Amazon, Audible, and iTunes.
It runs some 18 hours long (it’s a hefty book), but is delightful and
entertaining thanks to actress/narrator Toni Lewis.

Thursday, June 2, 2016

Lessons in the Dark by John
Greco is a thoughtful, contemplative collection of short essays on film. Classic films are the focus, but two
interesting devices are used to make the old favorites sharp and relevant to
today’s social ills: first, using simple themes of War, Discrimination, Social
Injustice, and the Media (the unit heading alone deliciously inferring that the
media is, or can be, another social ill).
Second, comparing a classic film to a newer or modern film of the same
subject. I would suggest that comparing
a classic film to a similar modern film may probably be a better way to
introduce younger people, who are not classic film fans, to old movies. It becomes not so much a contest as to which
is better, but rather it serves as a bridge to understanding.

This is part six in our
year-long monthly series on the current state of the classic film fan.Author John Greco is known to
many of us classic film bloggers for his excellent blog, Twenty-Four Frames. Here are
a few of his interesting observations:On I Was a Fugitive From a Chain Gang:“An interesting point is the
modernity of James Allen’s thinking after getting out of the Army. His mother
and Reverend Brother want him to go back to his factory job, however, James
doesn’t want to be tied down to a boring job he has no interest in. His brother
calls him ungrateful for not accepting his former bosses offer to get his job
back, but James wants something more exciting and wants to find himself.
His mother actually uses these words after she comes around to his way of
thinking. Finding oneself is such a modern notion, I was somewhat surprised to
hear it spoken in a 1932 film.”

On High Noon:

“Ironically, over the years, people and
even countries from both sides of the political spectrum have come to find their
own personal values in this film. The former Soviet Union accused the film of
being “a glorification of the individual.” Pro-McCarthyites saw the film as
communist propaganda and anti-American. Yet, President Ronald Reagan loved the
film for its lead character’s “strong sense of and dedication to duty and law.”
Both Presidents Eisenhower and Clinton loved the movie. Clinton ran the film no
less than 17 times while in office! He even recommended it to then incoming
President Bush. So the question becomes, how can one film be interpreted and be
satisfying to both sides of the political fence?”

John discusses the Pre-Codes, the
Depression, M*A*S*H, and Lenny, and ties them together. There’s Invasion
of the Body Snatchers, and Black
Legion. (My thanks to John for
referring to my book on Ann Blyth in his essay on Brute Force, which is part of his Films of Social Injustice
chapter.) I was especially taken with
his filmography of Orangey, a cat who most of us know from Breakfast at Tiffany’s, playing “Cat,” but who actually had a few
other films under his belt. Er, collar.

John and I discussed the notion that we
are on the threshold of a new era of film criticism in classic film:

JTL: I wondered, first, what you think about the
idea that film criticism and film history are now in the hands of so-called
(and I use this possibly disparaging word intentionally) amateurs -- because of blogs and the rise of self-publishing?
There was a time, and may still be among professional critics and academics,
that film, theatre, drama critique was a rarified world. It has now
become gloriously egalitarian. But there are pitfalls to that as well as
a huge boon to compiling the chronicle of our pop culture. What are your
thoughts on that?

JG: I
think it’s been both liberating and problematic. Self-publishing has opened up
doors for many writers. Overall, I think it's a great opportunity for writers
to get their work out there. If they go that route they should be professional
and responsible for and with their work. Of course, like in so many other
endeavors there is the good and the bad. Film history like all history can be
distorted if not reported correctly. As you know yourself, being an historian,
writing about film history like any subject requires a lot of research, and
fact checking that research to see how accurate it is. You see a lot of
misinformation out there. You got to do the investigative work. I’ve seen it
even in books. You read one book and it states one fact. Another book says
something completely different on that same subject. How do you incorporate
this sometimes contradicting information into your own work? For me, when
I am writing an article with historical background I want to make sure I get
the facts correct and check as many resources as possible. I hope all writers
do this.

Film
criticism today runs rampant. You’ve heard the term everyone’s a critic and
today that’s true more than ever before. Film criticism came into its own in
the 1960’s with people like Pauline Kael, Andrew Sarris and others. They took
film seriously as an art form. They analyzed it and told you why it was a good
film or not. Film criticism became legit, on the same level, with other arts.
Today with the internet, the “everyone’s a critic” thing has become a reality
and most of the time it’s things like “this film sucks” or “it’s awesome!”
Maybe not in those words but what is said is no deeper than that. You see it
all the time on IMDB or Letterboxd. To be a serious film critic or film
historian one must have a good knowledge of the subject. One should read and
study the reviews of critics like Kael, Ebert, Sarris and others. You can learn
what to look for just by reading their work. Studying the technical aspects of
filmmaking is important: editing, photography, lighting, etc. Film historians
do their research, film critics need to do the same. You can’t just write about
what you like saying how awesome it is. There’s got to be more.

JTL: I was very intrigued with your taking a
handful of topics - war, racism, etc., that are timeless and can be used on an
equal footing to compare classic films with newer films. It's a great
template and I think could be used to introduce younger people to classic films
more successfully than just saying, "Here's an old movie I love. You
should watch it too." By comparing older and newer films on the same
subject, you've hit upon a very useful model. I'd love to hear more about
your views on that. You have one foot in the world of the newer or modern
films, and I do not, so that is a great advantage and I admire that.

JG: Thank you. When I first began to think about
this book it was going in a completely different direction. Then, like I
mention in my introduction, a few years back, I was writing a column for a now
defunct pop culture on-line magazine. One of the publishers saw my blog, liked
it, and asked if I would be interested in writing a column on classic films.
His only caveat was I had to relate the films I wrote about to our world today
in hopes of connecting with its target audience, today's youth market.
After thinking about I realized how life repeats itself and there were
plenty of old films where we can learn modern day lessons. One of the first
films I wrote about was Ace in the Hole.
At the time, there were a couple of scandals going on about news reporters
falsifying or creating stories presented as facts. It was perfect. The more I
looked into this the more I found how so many classic films still talk to us
today. You just have to listen. The absurdity of war is brought to the front in
both Duck Soup and M*A*S*H. More recently, a powerful
film like “Spotlight” shows you investigative journalism at its best. Just like
it did in All the President’s Men.
These two films can be compared to more devious newspaper films like Blessed Event and Five Star Final which shows journalism in a much darker light. All
art is timeless. People just have to be open to it. I recently watched Brian
DePalma's Casualties of War and came
away from it seeing it as not just another war film about Vietnam, but as
a morality tale and the cost of war on the human spirit. Every soldier comes
home from war damaged. It's a price we are still paying for today.

Bob the Bear - a picture book by my twin brother & Me

Read Arte Acher's Falling Circus

Recent Comments on Past Posts:

It Happened to Jane is special to my family. My mother was selected to play the wife of Aaron Caldwell, the Chester town selectman in the movie and has a speaking part about the parking meter revenues gathered from outside his general store in the town center. My older brother was one of the cub scouts delivering coal donated by town residents to fuel Old 97. We grew up in Deep River. A few years ago a niece provided every member of music family copies of It Happened to Jane on DVD. The Connecticut River valley was truly an idyllic spot for growing up in the mid-Twentieth Century!

Thank you, the Lux Theatre broadcast was absolutely marvelous, and far superior, as you have indicated, the film. I have always admired Dorothy McGuire, and she has it all over Jean Peters. This is not as clear cut a differential between Joseph Cotton and Dan Dailey, but at this point in their grand careers, I will take Dan. Again thank you.

I jus watched this and I have to agree... the ending let me down. She left Howard Keel!!!! I've had a crush on him since seeing Seven Brides when I was 10.I did love the message that Rose Marie can be herself.But I'm still sad. Seriously, Rose Marie, you chose the wrong man.

My wife and I go back two decades for our love of “Remember the Night” and its heartwarming story...P.S. As I type these words I am reminded of the inscription my wife had engraved inside the wedding ring I now wear… “Remember The Night.”

Beautiful piece, Jacqueline, about yet another movie from the Unjustly Forgotten file. I agree a video release is decades overdue, (What is wrong with Universal Home Video? You'd think the only movies they ever made were monsters and Abbott & Costello. And don't even get me started on the pre-'48 Paramounts they're sitting on.) I count myself lucky to have scored a decent 16mm print on eBay some years back; otherwise it would have been a good 40 years since I saw it.

I happened upon this piece and wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed reading it. Really a great appreciation of a wonderful movie. Raoul Walsh is one of my favorite directors and this is the first of his movies I ever remember seeing--it was on the big screen back in 1952 so I guess that dates me but a movie like this was ideal for my age, both for the adventure and romance.

I guess I'm going to be busy reading all your blogs that touch on events I'm familiar with.

Judgement At Nuremberg caught my attention as I had the privilege of working in it for some 60 days. But more so as the German WWII history always recall my own trials during the war.

I suppose we filmed this around 1959-1960 which is not that long after the ending of the war. Reconstruction in Europe was far from accomplished. For the audience in 1961 this history was still a part of everyone's life.

I was overwhelmed sitting in that set and listening to the greatest actors of that generation orate day after day... an endless live theater.